


永遠在一起

by theflyjar



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses, Alternate Universe - Royalty, Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blood and Gore, Dreams, Gods, Kings & Queens, M/M, Manipulation, Mild Gore, Pagan Gods, Royalty, Self-Harm, Soul Bond, Suicide Attempt, Temporary Character Death, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-07
Updated: 2018-11-07
Packaged: 2019-08-20 04:46:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16549169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theflyjar/pseuds/theflyjar
Summary: Laikenis bound to one human life.





	永遠在一起

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Hornet394](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hornet394/gifts).



> This is so late, Charlotte, but I thought it would only be 1.5k overall and then I was so busy with other things, I couldn't sit down to properly finish it. However, late happy birthday, my love! The title, whilst it applies to the plot too, is also just me @ you (and Kira) constantly. Plus, the traditional version, just for you lmao. I cannot wait to see you next. I hope you enjoy this.
> 
> (Also, thank you, Sam, for coming up with Yifan's other name.)
> 
> This is unedited and mostly unbeta'ed.

The withered form of a man in chains is not appealing, not with his hair matted with sweat and dirt, and skin marred with filth. Fabric hangs from his body in nothing similar to finery; they’re rags, not robes. Metal clinks as the prisoner moves in his shackles under the gaze of Yixing as he approaches.

“You’ve not been washed,” is what Yixing says, albeit, gently. It’s what he always says. “I told you to wash.”

A couple of years ago, Yixing’s comment would get him spat at or thrown a string of vicious words. But, that defiant might is gone now. All that remains is a mere shrug.

The prisoner only washes when Yixing’s the one to bathe him but, as the emperor, Yixing is not inclined to do such things. Instead, he flicks his fingers for servants fo bring forth water, tea, and a hot broth. The prisoner, so slight and pale, scarfs it all down when it’s placed in front of him. It’s animalistic and lacking in all airs of grace. Still, Yixing smiles and pats the prisoner’s cheek admiringly.

“My love, you are a beast,” Yixing whispers, letting his fingers skitter up across the skin of the prisoner’s cheek and leaving them to rest at his jaw. “A truly beautiful beast.”

The man moves away from Yixing’s touch, knowing he won’t be struck or hit by the emperor for doing so. There’s an understanding between the two of them. The prisoner still has the right to reject the tenderness of the emperor, despite being stripped of almost all other rights within the kingdom. It’s what he gets for the crimes he has committed, and for taking the side of someone who once set out to topple Yixing from his throne and merge the kingdom that has been under Zhang rulership for centuries - maybe even millennia - with their own diminishing one. That was where the prisoner was discovered by Yixing.

 

_xxx_

 

He was not chained up nor skeletal. He sat proudly atop his horse, armour clad to his body as thick as the hide of a rhino. He wielded a sword far heavier than Yixing’s own, slicing Yixing’s men open until they spilled across the dirt floor of the battle.

It barely took a moment. Their eyes caught in the fray around them, world stopping and stalling until every single person was frozen in time, and Yixing had not known what it meant. The man did, face aghast and drawn in with guilt. His eyes, which Yixing had been sure that his eyes glowed in a pale grey, which faded out to brown.

He was a general, young yet experienced as he waded through the bodies he’d slain until he was within Yixing’s grasp. The battle had been lost for the waning kingdom in that exact moment, for their sharpest weapon bowed himself down at Yixing’s feet. The act had confused Yixing, but he took it as a sign of surrender. The prisoner was shackled as Yixing decollated the king who intended to topple him, who hissed at Yixing’s prisoner, _“Everything I sacrificed to you, only for you to betray your promises.”_

Yixing had not understood a single word of what the enemy king had said, only taking note that the man had said “sacrificed _to_ you,” and not “ _for_ you.” There was intrigue surrounding his strong, handsome prisoner, one that bewitched Yixing into bringing the man to his study and dining chambers, initially. He had hoped that staring at the man near-constantly would supply with his answers. That, however, did not.

It was Yixing’s coupling with his first concubine, the one ordained to be his empress, almost a year after the man’s capture. She was a girl, sweet on the tongue and pretty in the eyes, but she was a diplomatic figurine brought from a fractious kingdom to be kept in Yixing’s palace. Their wedding had been a grand affair, colour draping from everywhere and food, alcohol, and desire spilling from almost every usable surface. The people celebrate the ascension of the new empress, the dawning of a new era of youth under Yixing rule and her presence.

The prisoner did not attend the marriage ceremony, but he was taken to Yixing’s chamber for the emperor to observe, hands and feet bound together in heavy chains and metal. Yixing stared and stared until his new empress was brought to him, beautiful and virginal in her appearance. The prisoner remained, unnerving the girl and bringing humour to Yixing.

Once Yixing’s lips touched the girl’s cheek, she was despatched of by the prisoner. Not as a human. _No,_ as a large ravenous wolf. He slathered at the mouth, his saliva mixed with the girls blood as he ate through her skin and crushed her bones, uncaring of the screams ripping from her throat as he tore her apart.

Yixing marvelled at the sight of the beast, at his size and strength.

 _“Laiken,”_ he had whispered, the only name to call the wolf.

The wolf god, the one who governed the land and oversaw the terrors of the world, the one who waited with bated breath to slaughter and maim wrongdoers. Yixing rarely left sacrifices to _Laiken,_ and that thought, that split second moment as his new wife’s head was pierced straight through with tusk-length canine teeth, Yixing remembered what the old king had said.

 _Sacrificed_ to _you._

 _Sacrificed_ to _Laiken._

 _Laiken_ turns his large head to look at Yixing, his skull far bigger than Yixing’s vast bed sunk into the ground like a ditch. The beast barely fits into the bedroom, suffocating it with its fur and filling it with light from crystal white eyes, but he does not touch Yixing. He is curled awkwardly around Yixing, as if worried he would harm him.

Yixing does not know what power he has over the wolf god, but he wields it like Yifan - _Laiken -_ once held his sword to topple Yixing’s soldiers. Instead of cowering away in fear, Yixing claps his hands together in delight, as if his new wife had not just been torn apart and devoured in front of him. His prisoner is _Laiken,_ he has a god under his thumb and, seemingly, unwilling to do him any harm. It dizzies him with power for a split second before he draws in a breath, composing himself, readying himself for when the guards will surely burst through the door.

His wife’s screams of terror would not have gone unnoticed.

It takes almost a minute for them to enter, by which time _Laiken_ is gone and replaced with Yifan once more. Only, the shackles that had kept him bound are split into fragments glinting around the room, shattered in a way that’s impossible for any human. It appears as though they’ve simply combusted around Yifan’s arms and legs, freeing him.

Yifan is dragged back away from the bed chamber by the imperial guard. Yixing’s body simmers with excitement when he realises that Yifan goes willingly with Yixing’s guards, not fighting or consuming them like he did with the girl, who has no trace - other than a pool of blood and splintered bones on the floor of Yixing’s bedroom

By normal decree, Yifan would be sent to death by Yixing, by his government.

However, Yixing forbids Yifan from meeting his death at human hands. He declares that the death penalty shall not touch the man in chains. He shall, however, spend the rest of his days imprisoned in an old outpost on the outskirts of the city.

It’s well away from the palace, taking almost an hour or two to get there, but Yixing frequents it.

The promise Yixing gives his people and government is that he will not let anyone ascend into the role of empress until justice has been brought about. That manages to acquiesce both the people and his ministers, feebly proving his wish of hoping to punish the murderer of his wife, even if he himself knows the truth.

Yifan’s kept in a small room, one he would burst through the walls of, should he take his _Laiken_ form. He does not, he remains silent and close-lipped, most of the time.

He comes to Yixing in dreams. He looks like Yifan, but with _Laiken’s_ eyes, white and shining through into Yixing. According to the words from those dreams, _Laiken_ is bound to one human life and it’s heavily implied from that point onwards that Yixing is that human. _Laiken_ cannot harm his human, nor can he resist the requests and wishes of his human.

As the months go by after _Laiken’s_ first appearance, Yixing spends as much of his time at the outpost as possible, practically moving his study there to deal with the kingdom’s happenings as he remains near Yifan. _Laiken_ becomes a confidant and guide in Yixing’s dreams, giving him the insight of a god in how he should govern his people. Yixing learns, much to his own disbelief, that _Laiken_ is not a cruel overlord who rules with an iron fist, as legends tell and people think. _Laiken_ is benevolent and forgiving, somber and kind. He is the kind of ruler Yixing wishes to be, so he follows him with open eyes, never blindly and overly willing.

 _Laiken_ is his lover in his dreams, and Yixing is the only thing he’s covetous of. Yixing thinks the murder of his first wife was the emergence of _Laiken’s_ unwillingness to share his human, wishing to be the centre of his human’s world. It only takes Yixing explaining human diplomacy and forced marriages for _Laiken_ to understand that Yixing does not marry for love, he marries for an heir and safety of his people.

Yifan, however, when he looks up at Yixing, he stares at him in contempt. It appears that Yifan does not share _Laiken’s_ affections, given that he refuses to eat and wash. Such acts are either in hopes that Yixing will be repulsed by him and stop being forward in his affections, or that he’ll die before he ever softens to Yixing's affections. Those same ones which Yixing is hoping will spill out from the dreams he has with _Laiken_ into the real world, not simply retained by his sleep-state. Yixing takes Yifan’s lack of lashing out in recent times, as a sign of positive change in their relationship.

But, Yixing doesn’t know if that’s just lack of will, rather than spite fading to adoration. He hopes it's the latter, as he wishes to, one day, unshackle Yifan and sit with him like two humans. Not prisoner and emperor. Maybe even like an emperor and a god, one as the earthly embodiment and voice of the other.

 

_xxx_

 

Yixing puts the tea to Yifan’s lips and he gulps it down, some of it running out of the edge of his mouth, down to his chin until it drips down onto his sullied robes. Yixing sighs and draws out a set of keys, unlocking the bindings around Yifan's wrists, ankles, and torso.

Reflexively, Yifan undresses himself, and stands bare before Yixing.

Yixing frowns when he sees that Yifan's body is hardly anything more than skin and bone, he reckons Yifan would be too weak to even shift into his true wolf form. They sit down opposite each other, Yixing with a cloth in his hand and his pristine robes pulled up to the elbow on his left arm, dipping the fabric into the warm water at his side. He begins to swipe the fabric across Yifan's skin, wiping away the dirt and natural odour of Yifan's perspiration, replacing it with orange blossom - the perfume Yixing had asked to be added to the water. Yifan's eyes close whilst Yixing hand bathes him, moving his body easily for Yixing to access the awkward patches of skin. He even moves without protesting when Yixing tugs and pulls at him, manoeuvring them until the water bowl is between Yixing's legs on the ground and Yifan's laying back towards it, his hair submerged in the water with Yixing's fingers running through it. The water has turned from glacier clear to a brownish haze, and Yifan's skin looks far clearer than it had before. His pale skin stretches across the bony parts of his body, sunlight not giving him the golden glow it once did, given that Yifan isn't allowed outside all that much.

Yixing leaves him unbound and dries his hair, using the fine silks of the emperor's robes to do so, and he calls out for one of the guards to bring them a comb or toothed hair-pin, so he can untangle where Yifan's hair has clumped together. When they're brought one, the guard bows deeply to Yixing as he hands the ornate comb over to the emperor, and Yixing waves him off immediately. He wishes to be alone with Yifan in that dark, damp cell, until Yixing's called back to his everlasting meetings. They do not speak, but Yixing hums, and Yifan's eyes stay closed as Yixing tenderly swipes the comb through Yifan's hair until it runs through without much resistance. If only Yixing could do such a thing with Yifan in his bedchambers, where he could sit with the moonlight streaming into the room and on the comfort of his own bed, until they both fall asleep curled up around one another.

“My love,” Yixing whispers, heart softening when Yifan's eyes instantly flicker open, answering and acknowledging the endearment, “one day, I hope you can live by my side, not shackled to it.”

Yifan says nothing, but Yixing's sure, without a trace of his pale, godly eyes, that Yifan's lips pull up slightly at the edges. It's almost a smile at Yixing's declaration, but

“I am working on it, I promise you. It's just, it's difficult; the kingdom has not forgotten the tragedy that unfolded on the night of my first wedding, and there are still calls for your head to be put on a spike at the gates of the kingdom.” Yixing sighs, placing down the comb to run his fingertips over the clean planes of Yifan's cheeks. “I have tried to tell them repeatedly that I do not care for the death of that girl, that her old kingdom has vanished at the will of _Laiken_ and her disappearance does not matter all that much to our diplomacy because of that. Still, the people believe she was to be their empress. They treat her bloodied vanishing like an imperial death, of which I do not agree.”

“Why don't you let them kill me? My human vessel is dying here, anyway,” Yifan whispers, voice scratched up and perforated with disuse. “Let your people see justice for their empress and gain their respect. Make an example of me, parade by beheaded body through the city and take an eye for an eye, for your people. I am a god, I cannot _die,_ per se.”

It's the most Yixing's ever heard Yifan speak, and he's in awe of it, of the smoothness his voice has by the end of his short speech, and how his dark eyes bore into Yixing's. He's flooded with affection, lost in the sensation of the words Yifan choses and how his vocal cords produce them, rather than being physically present to process what is said.

Once the enamoured glow fades from Yixing's mind and the realisation of Yifan's words hits him, he withdraws his fingers from Yifan's skin, halting the invisible patterns he was drawing and leaving them incomplete.

“I will do no such thing.”

“Why not? I am immortal, I am not bound to this body forever.”

Yixing's lips quiver, trembling in a way that hasn't happened since the death of his parents as a child, “Because I cannot bear to see blood spilt over something inconsequential.”

“Emperor Zhang, your first wife's devouring is not _inconsequential.”_

Something spikes within Yixing, an indignant snort of, “You are her killer, don't you remember? Did you not see her inconsequential enough to eat her practically on our marriage bed?”

“I thought her to be too important, to be a person who would stand between your devotion to me and my duties as a god.”

“And what of my wives now? Of my children? Of my heirs? Do they stand in the way of my devotion? You must remember, Yifan, _Laiken,_ however you wish for me to consider you, that it is _you_ that is an immovable dam between me and _my_ devotion to _them._ I am rarely at the palace, I have hardly seen the first years of my children's lives, all because I pledge almost all of my time to being to being the emperor and being your human soulmate, which _you_ do not even accept. People have given you their sacrifices, and I have given you my life, my soul.”

“You have not been the first to do as such,” Yifan hisses indignantly, shifting his gaze to the wall off to the side of them and tears spill from Yixing's eyes, dripping down onto Yifan's forehead.

“Then what do you wish to have from me? Do I have to give you my own human death? To free my soul from this fleshy chamber I call a body? I am not a god, I cannot bide over anything outside of my imperial power; I truly have nothing else to give you, other than my death. If you wish for that, then devour me, like you did with _her._ Consume me until there is nothing left but the robes from my body, until I am digested and dissolved into your bloodstream, is that _binding_ enough for you? Is it enough for my weak, human body to sustain your immortal being?”

“Your soul is no longer bound to mine once you die, it is relinquished from your body and flows into the river of souls to go towards the afterlife, that I, as an immortal, shall never reach. As long as your soul is entwined with your body, we shall be connected. I do not wish to have your death.”

“Then what on this Earth do you want from me?!” Yixing barks out, running thin on patience.

Yifan does not speak. Nor does he look at Yixing still. Yixing feels as if he's the one who’s inconsequential, even if a god considers him to be a soulmate. Everything that’s been unfolding and blossoming in his head for a few years now seems so aimless, so baseless and unfounded.

Yixing wonders if this is the ruthlessness _Laiken_ is known for embodying, if there's really no line between Yifan and _Laiken_ at all, if they're all truly one being's thoughts. The thought that he’s been manipulated and fooled, twisted around the finger of _Laiken_ ruminates in his mind. Suddenly everything crumbles in Yixing's head, like a temple crumbling to its foundations after an earthquake. He’s thinking of every moment he has spent in this horrific outpost rather than tending to his wives and children. Thinking of every moment he's spent fixated on Yifan and _Laiken_ and them both in combination. He weeps over Yifan's head, droplets falling like diamonds directly from his eyes, body trembling and mind going numb.

He wonders if he's been subject to this god's cruel will. If _Laiken_ thought him an easy yet powerful target for a toy, something to fill his immortal years playing with.

Blindly, Yixing reaches into his robes and procures from there a dagger he’s always kept concealed. He holds it up above them and a dark smile curls on Yifan's lips.

“I told you, I am immortal.” There's no emotion to Yifan's voice, but Yixing knows he is not being taken seriously. Everything suggests that Yifan’s bored of his lashing out already, like he is unamused by Yixing’s emotional outburst. “You cannot kill me with that, human.”

Under the force of Yixing’s muscled arm, the dagger swiftly towards his own body, breaking through the flesh of his stomach and piercing through to spill blood over Yifan’s forehead. Where teardrops fell is now coated and smudged with warm, pulse-flowing blood. Yixing drags the blade across, until he feels warm, wet innards slipping out through the slash in his abdomen.

Still, the feeling of the blade in his stomach hurts far less than the thought of being led astray by the wolf god, who’s supposedly meant to love him.

He wonders if he even knows what love is, seeing as no one _truly_ seems to love him, not even this divine being who’s filled his head with the unshakeable notion of them being soulmates. Only, he’s not so certain of anything. Of love, of soulmates, of how he’s lived his life since meeting _Laiken._ If this is the game of a god, it’s a horrifically barbarous one. Tragic, too. He hopes the pain of his actions drives a sharp, emotional knife-tip of pure agony into the chest of the apathetic divine creature.

“No,” he gargles around the words, blood clogging up this throat and spitting out of his mouth, “but I can kill myself.”

Yixing hears Yifan yelling frantically for the guards, for anyone, to come and help him. Yixing's fingers are pulled away from the dagger's hilt and that's the last thing he feels before they go numb, struggling to breathe as a drowning sensation fills Yixing's lungs and he sputters out bloodied coughs. It's so painful until everything slips away, leaving only the glowing light of the lamps on the walls behind Yifan's head and Yifan leaning over Yixing's surely prone body, panic-stricken and looking beautiful and beastly with Yixing’s blood dripping down his face.

The last thing Yixing feels are warm droplets touching his skin, skimming down his cheeks. Everything else is phantom, not really existing as Yixing's soul is tugged from his body.

There is resistance to the whispering tendrils trying to guide him to the river Yifan spoke of. They plead for him to let go, and he does, but there's something else clamping down on his soul. There's no concrete sensation of what's holding his soul to his body, but it reminds Yixing of teeth, large and piercing, holding onto him and refusing to let go.

Yixing thinks of teeth driving through the skull and brain of a young girl, pushing their way in to discard of her light and pure soul, to rid her of it. He wonders if those teeth can keep hold of a soul just as powerfully as they can dispatch of one.

He feels his soul stretching between the two powers, unable to do anything, feeling as though it may simply tear down the middle, to leave his spirit in half and broken for the rest of eternity.

 

_xxx_

 

Yixing awakens, not with a gasp from a nightmare and not in the afterlife. He resides in his own bedchamber, people scurrying around the bed and speaking too quickly for him to understand. He blinks slowly, lips and mouth too dry to alert anyone that he is awake once more. It takes one of lesser servants, one he doesn’t recognise, to notice that his eyes are open for the atmosphere to change. There is shock, ripe and turbulent, rippling amongst people, and healers step forward.

They barrage him with a thousand questions, ones he cannot answer.

 _My little human,_ he hears a voice sigh in his head, wrapped in relief and love.

His eyes search around the room for Yifan, for any sign of the god. He does not know yet if he’s to recoil away or run to the source, but he cannot see him. He can do neither if he cannot even see him.

Yixing’s thoughts are split into two, one side is preoccupied with locating Yifan in the barrage of people, the other is aware of the fact that he is not dead when he certainly should be. He does not attempt to move from where he is, with fingers checking over bandaging and voices muted by his hearing, as if he’s underwater. He lets himself be moved, fed, and given cooled, sweetened tea, pampered like he’s a princely child with the flu all over again.

Only, this time, it’s different. The circumstances for him, at least, are the polar opposite. His bodily harm was self-inflicted, though, no one is scorning him for being reckless as the monarch of their kingdom. They regard him with a kind of reverence, not just as he would as an emperor, there’s an edge to it. Everyone wants to touch him and hold themselves back from doing so, as if their hands may taint him. When the healers recede, they are replaced by figures from the temples, the holy people of whom Yixing has little contact. They devote themselves to the gods and Yixing, though, mainly the former.

It seems, as they all bow and chant at the foot of the bed, that their holy veneration extends to him. As if he’s a god, as if he’s one of the heavenly bodies that rules over their world, not just their king.

They are not blessing him, not wishing him well in his recovery, they are hoping to be blessed by him, as if he carries such a power. It’s dizzying, there’s so much going on, and Yixing still can’t seem to get a solid grip on just what is happening to him. He no longer appears to be a proxy of the omnipotent, he _is_ the omnipotent.

The chanting lasts for numerous bells of the day, only interspersed by healers checking him over and servants carrying in foods and tea for him to drink. He is bathed once, in very much the same way he had bathed Yifan, with only a bowl of water and a cloth.

Still, he doesn’t speak, not even uttering a word to any one. Even if he only truly has one thing stuck in his head.

There has been no talk or sign of Yifan, not since Yixing heard the voice in his head once he’d awoken.

It isn’t until the next sunset when Yixing’s third concubine enters that he talks, asking her, “The prisoner?”

She knows who he is asking after as she sits at the edge of his bed, scrolls in hand and a frown pushing down her eyebrows. Her long hair isn’t wrapped up, it falls freely around her shoulders but keeps away from her face, framing her displeased look.

“I know you wish to be an emperor favoured by all, but your concern for the one who attempted to assassinate you is unfounded.” She’s the most serious of all his wives, the daughter of a straight-laced general from the north. “You do not need to spend your days at that outpost anymore.”

“What happened?”

“You were stabbed in the gut by that prisoner with your grandfather’s dagger you always carry with you. You were brought back to the palace, not quite dead but close to it.” She stops there, pushing forth the scrolls she’s now placed on her lap. “Now, these are the current affairs of the kingdom, I think it’s best if you look these over and get reacquainted with some issues.”

She says nothing more, only frowning deeper when she stands and leaves the room, her servants scurrying behind her and leaving Yixing to the dim light he’s been sat in since the sun set.

Instead of opening the scrolls, he chews his thumb.

Maybe it’s the lingering fingertips of obsession, one he should be rid of, relinquished of as he’s figured out that he was manipulated by the god. Other than that one phrase, _Laiken_ has all but abandoned him to a tear in his stomach and pain throughout his body. And to a conspiracy that Yifan was the one who used the dagger. The word ‘ _assassinate’_ that his third wife used is all too clear to him already. Yifan would have been executed, possibly just after the news of the “attack” broke. Maybe immediately after, Yixing has no way of knowing.

Even if Yifan’s a god, even if he says his human body being destroyed would do nothing to truly harm his immortal godliness, Yixing sheds a tear. He sheds multiple, actually. They cascade down his face. He hadn’t wanted Yifan to be hurt, but he’d lashed out in anger, furious at how feeble his human body is and how easily his mind had been twisted to think of only _Laiken_ in his Yifan form.

They’re tears of sorrow and frustration, husking him until he feels like a bag of skin left to deflate where he lies.

His recovery is a lonely process, only this third wife visits and that’s only to discuss politics and sneak scrolls to Yixing during the night. His other wives, he assumes, are preoccupied with their own duties, or disallowed from seeing him, given the hold his third wife has over the guards. If the daughter of a powerful general looks upon the guards favourably, it’ll reflect well on them and open up doors for their futures.

It’s most likely self-betterment.

Yixing doesn’t care, he pours over the scrolls he has and takes his daytime to think of how to govern his kingdom from, what was once, his near-deathbed. He spends his nights crying, weeping over the pseudo-death of an immortal god he’s sure never even loved him back. It’s unending, when he wakes alone, his eyes ache, and when he closes his eyes his dreams are of darkness. Black, all-consuming voids swallow him and his consciousness whole. There are no kisses and no gentle brushes of fingers through his hair, no kind words of love and guidance, there’s only pin-drop silence and lack of sight.

He imagines that’s what death is like, he imagines if that’s what it means to have a body with no soul.

 

_xxx_

 

Yixing isn’t allowed to walk during his first public outing. He’s placed onto a litter, which is carried by numerous young men through the streets. Where cheering and wishes for change were once yelled in his direction, all that’s left is more silence. This time, it’s deafening. There are hundreds of people, not a single one making any type of sound, but all are on their knees, they bow down to the ground when he passes and remain down until - he assumes - he’s out of sight.

Surreal doesn’t describe the atmosphere accurately enough, even if reality does feel as though it’s shifted and evolved into something more, something beyond.

He’s never witnessed a spectacle like it before.

He doesn’t know why it’s him that it’s happening to.

Still, he smiles when he meets the eyes of his people and tries to acknowledge those that will allow him.

The happy curl of his lips remains until he’s brought to the main square, where it drops and falls clean off his face. It’s been weeks since he last saw Yifan alive and he’s been brought to see what is clearly, Yifan’s rotting corpse. His head, mounted on a spike, sits proudly in the centre of the square, and his body is dismembered and mutilated almost beyond recognition. None of the cuts are clean, his body is sagged and darkened with decay, some of the flesh having rotted and fallen to the ground.

He thinks this death would have been painful, but he wasn’t sure if Yifan could even feel that much on Earth. Maybe being torn apart didn’t hurt him all that much. That doesn’t stop Yixing’s mind from producing images, from soundtracking those moving mental images with screams of terror and agony.

“Take them down,” he croaks, getting the attention of all close enough to hear. No one moves a muscle. Soon, he roars, _“Take those wretched things down!”_

People hurtle to do as commanded, shock finally sending a ripple of noise through the crowds as people ask each other what’s going on. They thought Yixing would celebrate the death of his attempted assassin. Yixing cannot stomach that. He weeps the whole journey back to the palace, showing his distress that ripples through his decumbent body. He mourns for something not dead, but the loss is all too much.

The dismembered body only reminds him of how broken he is inside.

 

_xxx_

 

“You were supposed to die,” his third wife says, sat opposite Yixing on the other side of the table. “Your heart could barely beat anymore, your stomach spilt out from you, and you were greyer than the winter seas of the north. You laid in your bed for twelve days, barely alive but not close enough to death for it to take you.”

Yixing stills his hand around the pen brush he’s holding, halting his scribing and staring at the woman sat directly in front of him. Her servants appear apprehensive, as if she’s revealing something she’d vowed not to, Yixing can see it in the way they glance and mutter to one another. Yixing’s other wives let out short exclaims, though, they do nothing to stop his third wife from speaking what is clearly their truth.

She herself takes no heed of any of them, she continues as she curls the characters from the ink at the end of her own brush. It’s like she’s making casual conversation at first, not revealing Yixing to the moments he’s been unaware of.

“You laid there, doing nothing, for twelve nights. Upon the thirteenth morning, a miracle was bestowed upon you, upon the city, by _Laiken.”_

Yixing’s heart stops still in his chest as she speaks the name, uttering it with such deference that Yixing’s reminded of his own awe of setting his eyes upon _Laiken_ for the first time.

“Your soul was between the wolf god’s teeth, walked through the streets and to the palace steps. You had been hanging in limbo for almost a fortnight, your soul separated from your body and _Laiken_ returned it to you himself. You, Emperor Zhang Yixing, have been bestowed the honour of a god to our people. Even the gods look upon you and love you.”

Yixing opens his mouth to respond, unsure of what to say. He’s interrupted by a voice in his head.

 _She’s right,_ it says, taking on Yifan’s voice. Closing his eyes slowly, Yixing savours the sound. Albeit, bitterly. _The gods do love you._

Yixing wants to ask: but do you love me?

He doesn’t. Though, the thought alone seems to be enough for Yifan to respond.

_Of course I love you, I would not have ventured into the afterlife and wrestled your soul from death itself if I did not love you, Yixing._

There’s a falter within Yixing, both as his third wife touches his arm to draw his attention back to her, and in his belief in Yifan’s words. He meets eyes with the woman in front of him and smiles, apologising for missing what she said, and he blocks out the voice roaming around in his mind, attempting to be heard.

When Yixing returns to his bed chambers, Yifan’s sat upon Yixing’s bed with his eyes closed and legs crossed. He’s so full in the cheeks and healthy looking, very much like the powerful soldier Yixing had met him as, and Yixing flusters, turning to the servants who attempt to follow him in. He cannot let them see Yifan there, especially not in that form.

Instead, Yixing ensures the door is shut behind him and rushes to Yifan’s side, robes billowing around him as he moves, and Yifan stands to greet him. Relief flushes over Yifan, it’s clear to see. The exact opposite of the apathy Yixing had once received from him.

“You look so well, little human,” Yifan says first, and Yixing slaps him clean across the face. That takes Yifan aback, shock marring everything.

“How dare you not let me die there,” Yixing hisses, eyes cold and hard, “and how dare you let them kill you like that!”

Yifan takes ahold of Yixing’s cheeks, smiling gently despite the red blotch on the side of his face and the ferocity in which he hopes he’s looking at Yifan with, “Your people love you more now, don’t they?”

“What does that have to do with anything?” Yixing does not pull away from the fingers that cup his jaw, even if he knows he should. He’s missed these tender moments all too much. It’s been almost four moon cycles since he last saw Yifan and his stomach has now healed with an ugly, knotted scar spanning from one side to the other. It’s been too long to have gone without this. “I didn’t want you do die.”

“So, you killed yourself to spare me? When I was locked up in that prison and given a guaranteed death sentence because those guards didn’t even entertain the thought you could have done that to yourself?”

“You’re a god, you could have escaped,” Yixing retorts, the words rolling off his tongue so easily because they’ve been sat there for so long.

Silence surges between them, Yixing holding his breath and Yifan, well, Yixing’s not entirely sure if Yifan even breathes.

“I wished to stay near you.” Yifan bows his head down to Yixing’s. “I needed to stay around you to find your soul and latch onto it before it slipped away, I couldn’t escape because I could not leave you. My old body didn’t mean anything much, I became my true form and remained that away until you had awoken, and i only forged myself this body today, to see you.”

Yifan looks almost identical, though, he has a few minor changes. They make him look more human, more tangible to Yixing. There’s the odd freckle here and there, dark little splodges of pigment that look so normal, so much like they belong there, that Yixing finds it weird to think that Yifan’s old appearance was devoid of such things. He was perfection all over, godly and pristine. But now, in front of Yixing, he’s human perfection, regal alongside Yixing.

“But, you hated me,” Yixing finally airs, an invisible fist of tension curling around his heart. “You despised me. You never once acknowledged my feelings, nor did you make me feel any kind of love, but then you’d come and get into my head by invading my dreams where you’d be everything I want you to be. I don’t know what you want from me, I don’t know _who_ you really are, and what is really happening here.”

“I only wanted what was best for you… I may see and know most of the things in this world, but I do not know how to do what’s best for you, as the human I am bound to. I thought…” Yifan sighs and changes his voice to a whisper. “I knew how much time you were wasting in that outpost with me. You weren’t neglecting your duties - we both know you’d never do that - but I had taken you away from your people. _And,_ your people wanted me executed for what I had done to their empress.”

“You didn’t have to die…”

“If you had released me or lessened the sanctions against me, you would have lost the support of your people over this matter. I am the murderer of their empress. It shows how much they supported and favoured your union with her, through their outcry over what I had done.”

“Why did you kill her?” Yixing asks in a hushed tone, mirroring Yifan.

“Gods have a duty to the people who worship them because our power comes from the mortals’ beliefs in us, and we do favours in return for complete devotion.” Layer by layer, as Yifan speaks, he removes the robes from Yixing’s body, revealing him slowly to show his skin. “The more a kingdom worships us, the more we favour them, and we go back and forth until there is nothing more we can do for one another. It was one of my duties to kill your empress.”

“But, but,” Yixing searches for the words, “she only became empress after you were captured.”

“Just because I was captured, that didn’t remove my powers and responsibilities. The king I followed into the battle where we met, I still had to complete what I had promised him. Which was to end your dynasty, to halt it in his tracks so he could find power here, so he could reap the benefits from the beautiful kingdom you’ve sown.

There was, however, a loophole in what he asked of me. Instead of asking for what he wanted explicitly, his phrasing had left me with more options than he probably intended. I had, in the beginning, set out to kill you.” Yixing’s heart stops in his chest, right at the moment Yifan strips him bare, leaving him only to wear his scar across his midriff. “Then, I saw you. I knew I couldn't ever hurt you. I knew you would be my greatest power _and_ my greatest weakness. So, I took the chance to bide my time until I could act upon my duty, using that selfish king’s words against him.”

“What was is that he asked for?” Yixing stares, bewildered, as Yifan’s fingers touch along his stomach, smooth and warm against his skin. So human, yet so heavenly. The red fades with the loving swipe across his stomach, the scarring easing away but not fading completely.

“He asked me to ensure that your empress never bears a child.” Yifan looks Yixing in the eye whilst he confesses. “I carried out my duty in murdering her and, for reasons I cannot myself fathom, you have never taken on another empress. Only ever consorts of no truly great power without favouring one over the others, not even when your heirs were born.”

Yixing stands stark naked by the side of his bed, Yifan’s hands moving away from the scar and back up to his face, cradling him and drawing them even closer to one another.

“But why…? Why were you so cold to me?” His voice sounds paper thin, stripping strength away from him and leaving him as bare as his skin.

“Losing the favour of your people would have been the biggest loss you’d ever feel, Yixing. I know how important they are to you. They wanted justice for what had been done to their empress by the prisoner you tried to treat with kindness and, with what you’d done to yourself, they wanted justice

“You spat at me,” Yixing’s teeth grind, “more than once, too. You made me feel so worthless that I _wanted_ to hurt you, so I hurt myself. You _hated_ me.”

“I did not hate you. I just… I knew you would never harm me if you loved me, so I thought maybe you’d lash out and do something if I provoked you enough. But, years went by, Yixing, and you still came to me so tenderly, and you needed to do _something._ I just… I didn’t realise you’d prefer to hurt yourself than to hurt me. You’re so different to all the other humans I’ve ever met and I can see why you were chosen to be my mortal.”

Tears, ones Yixing thought he’d already cried out, spill out over his lashline and down onto his cheeks. “I thought you were two different people, that Yifan was some human host for a god, but in those last few moments, I realised you were one in the same. You made me feel like no one could ever really love me, that I had never truly felt loved by anyone, and I wanted to hurt you, _so badly._ No physical damage I could ever inflict upon you would be permanent enough to show you the pain I felt in that moment.”

“But you knew hurting yourself, _killing yourself,_ would hurt me… Doesn’t that show that I loved you? If your death would leave the damage you intended.”

“No, I did not know that would happen.” Yixing breathes out slowly, “I had hoped it. I killed myself in the hope that you loved me enough to feel hurt.”

Yifan’s thumbs wipe up the tears that try to trail the whole way down his face and the pressure of Yifan’s hands keep him looking upwards, maintaining eye contact. Yifan kisses Yixing’s cheek, staying so close that his lips skim across the side of Yixing’s mouth.

“I am so sorry for what I have done to you, for how much I made you doubt yourself, and now, I am here to serve you until death parts us.” Yifan kisses his skin again.

“Do you promise?”

“I did not go against every single rule, as a god, by going straight to the afterlife to bring your soul back only to leave you. I showed myself, in my godly form, to your people in order to stay by your side and restore their faith in you as their ruler favoured by their most powerful god. Now, with all the temples you had built and your apparent endorsement of me as the god of your people, I am stronger than I had ever been, and I can remain by your side. No one else, not even another god, would be able to take me away from you.

“Even after death, I shall keep your soul with me, by my side, so we never have to part.”

When Yixing kisses Yifan, he does not expect to be bedded by the god, and certainly does not expect to see the _Laiken’s_ sigil tattooed on the dip of his throat by the time they wake up in the morning again. The sun has not yet risen and the silver shimmering ink of the god’s symbol glints under candlelight, and that’s when the god proves his love for Yixing again, their bodies warm and dewed with sweat. They barely make a sound as they move, not wanting to alert the guards surrounding Yixing’s room that the emperor has been joined by someone, lest they discover the prisoner they thought dead helping himself to the pleasure of their emperor’s body. The moment is beautiful, though, Yifan’s eyes shimmering through with the true colours of _Laiken,_ the same colour which glows upon Yixing’s throat.

 

_xxx_

 

Yixing steps from the palace on his own, not a litter in sight. The streets are lined, once again, with a crowd divided by a wide pathway down the centre, the route Yixing shall take to observe his people mapped out before him.

There is far more noise this time, people tittering with excitement at the sight of their ruler, and people even lay flowers on the ground before him.

Silence only falls once again when the large wolfish form of _Laiken_ appears. The people wait with bated breath as their monarch and god walk towards one another. _Laiken_ bows his head down into Yixing’s reaching distance and Yixing’s hands feel the hot muzzle of his lover, feeling the familiar fur beneath his skin.

The entire kingdom watches on in awe as their emperor presses his forehead to the wolf god’s, letting them be privy to a moment of intimacy.

 


End file.
